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New Phase of the Brooklyn Marine Terminal Plan, Same Battle Lines

BQE Admin on November 7, 2025

By COLE SINANIAN 

new@queensledger.com

At the first of three scoping meetings for the Brooklyn Marine Terminal redevelopment project, more than a dozen Red Hook, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens and Columbia Street residents slammed the NYC Economic Development Corporation’s (EDC) plan to build waterfront housing and upgrade the industrial port in Red Hook for its alleged failure to adequately address environmental and transportation concerns, and requested that planners improve community outreach and conduct a thorough environmental study. 

New Front, Same Battle Lines 

The BMT Vision Plan, approved September 22 by an EDC-appointed task force, has been both lauded for its ambition and criticized by community members for its haste and alleged lack of transparency. The $3.5 billion plan outlines what will be among the largest redevelopments in New York City history once completed by the late 2030s, with some 122-acres of waterfront land stretching from the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal to the southern end of Brooklyn Bridge Park slated for redevelopment. 

“For the first time in many years, there is a plan that offers a real long-term path forward to create a first-class facility for essential transportation infrastructure,” wrote president of the International Longshoreman Association Frank Agosta and Red Hook Container Terminal President Michael Stamatis in an April amNY Op-Ed. 

But since the beginning, the BMT project has been marred by controversy. Earlier this year, the vote to approve the plan was postponed five times— held only after the EDC had secured a two-thirds majority in a process that some have described as secretive and undemocratic. 

“We have been totally disheartened by the process,” said Cobble Hill resident and former Cobble Hill Association president Franklin Stone during her testimony at the October 28 meeting.  “I’m a believer that good processes lead to a good result. This is not leading to a good result.” 

The October 28 meeting was the first of a series of meetings that will eventually inform the City’s Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the BMT project. A virtual meeting was held on October 30, while a final in-person meeting will be held on December 1 at Sacred Hearts & St. Stephen Church in Carroll Gardens. The meetings are an effort to encourage public engagement in the Draft Scope of Work (DSOW), a document that will decide the specifics of the environmental review study, which will be conducted by the environmental consultancy group AKRF.

After the EIS is published, the state’s Empire State Development Corporation will use it to draft the BMT General Project Plan sometime in 2026. Members of the public can submit comments on the DSOW until December 11, after which a Final Scope of Work will be published that lists all comments and how they’ll be implemented into the EIS. 

Karen Blondel speaks in favor of the BMT redevelopment plan at a scoping meeting on Tuesday, October 28. Photo by Cole Sinanian

Divided Opinion 

Public testimonies at the October 28 meeting largely centered on traffic issues, environmental resilience concerns, and the EDC’s communication and outreach to the affected communities, which community members criticized as inadequate. The meeting began with a brief presentation by the EDC’s Senior Vice President of Neighborhood Strategies Nathan Gray, who described the project’s background and outlined the environmental review process. Then AKRF Senior Environmental Director Johnathan Keller explained what the EIS will include, followed by testimonies from members of the public, who were given three minutes each. 

In her testimony, Stone spoke about the inadequate transportation links in her neighborhood. The B61 bus, which serves Cobble Hill, is often delayed, while drivers are frequently stuck in stop-and-go traffic behind the large freight trucks coming from the area’s last-mile distribution centers. The BMT plan’s proposed housing — 60% of which would be luxury — could nearly  double the neighborhood’s population. 

“You are proposing to build this whole project in a transportation wasteland,” Stone said. “All you really have to do is live in the neighborhood, and you find that it takes you a half hour to go to three blocks. “It’s simply too much housing, and too much industrial, and all the attendant traffic for the amount of space.” 

Columbia Waterfront District resident James Morgan opened his testimony by recalling the destruction caused by Hurricane Sandy 13 years ago and reminding the EDC panel that climate change will only worsen natural disasters like Sandy. 

“Therefore we request that the EIS consider adaptive mitigation triggers that are tied to future conditions beyond 2038, through at least 2050 to 2080,” Morgan said. 

Sharon Gordon, a 20-year resident of Tiffany Place, echoed Morgan’s concerns and drew attention to the study area outlined in the DSOW, which would extend in a 400-foot radius from the proposed construction site. 

“It is necessary to expand the technical study to at least Third Ave and Tillery Street,” Gordon said. “Otherwise, communities that will certainly be affected from pollution and flood risk aspects, such as Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens and Gowanus, will be excluded from the impact assessment.”

In a statement to the Star, EDC spokesperson Chuck Park clarified that the 400-ft study area around the BMT site is not the only area that will be studied in the environmental assessment. A separate transportation study area, for example, will look at surrounding transportation features like BQE ramps and intersections well outside the 400-ft radius. 

A handful of speakers at the meeting, including Morgan and Gordon, proposed splitting the environmental study into separate processes— one for the industrial port section of the development, and another for the housing component, which is currently slated for the northern portion of the BMT property.

When asked if this was a possibility, Park — who attended the meeting — emphasized that the BMT Vision Plan was approved by a two-thirds supermajority in September, then later provided a generic email statement praising the plan. 

“NYCEDC remains fully committed to transforming this waterfront site into a modern all-electric maritime port, alongside a vibrant mixed-use community – delivering thousands of permanently affordable homes, thousands of new jobs, public open and green space, and an engine of economic opportunity for the community and the city,” the statement read. 

During his testimony, Columbia Street Waterfront District resident and tenant organizer John Leyva criticized the EDC’s failure to elect residents of the neighborhood to its task force. 

“The Columbia Street Waterfront, which will bear the brunt of this redevelopment— the traffic, the sound, the construction that will happen right here next to us — has never had a representative of its own on the task force,” Leyva said. “That exclusion is unacceptable.”

Still, some attendees had a more positive outlook on the BMT development. Karen Blondel, a community activist and president of the Red Hook Houses West — which forms the largest public housing complex in Brooklyn and one of the largest in the country — was optimistic about the BMT development’s potential to continue the transformation of a neighborhood that has historically been associated with crime and industrial decay. 

“This project could bring good industrial and maritime jobs, it can strengthen our local economy— that’s something that’s been neglected in Red Hook since I got here in the 1980s,” Blondel said. “When I got here at 19, all the industrial places were closing up, it felt unsafe. Prior to that, this was known as Al Capone land. So we’ve come a long way in a short period of time.” 

At the start of her testimony, Blondel drew attention to the room’s occupants, emphasizing that many of the speakers were from the wealthier Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens neighborhoods and none were from the Red Hook Houses. 

Blondel continued: “We have to start addressing the residents, the children who are here now. I want to know what the socio-economic impact is on neighborhoods like Red Hook Houses, when we’re not as organized as some of our more affluent neighbors.”

 

NYC Industrial Plan Sparks Backlash, Gentrification Fears at Brooklyn Town Hall

BQE Admin on November 7, 2025

By COLE SINANIAN

news@queensledger.com 

At a town hall in Downtown Brooklyn on October 16, city planners faced sharp criticism from activists and North Brooklyn business leaders as they presented a first draft of the “NYC Industrial Plan” —  a report first published in September that recommends rezoning some of the city’s historically industrial areas to allow for different kinds of economic uses and housing construction. 

Although it could inform future land-use policy decisions, the plan is a draft report and does not guarantee any future rezonings, city planners stressed at the town hall, with a final version set to be released on December 31. Still, the plan drew swift condemnation from groups like Evergreen, a manufacturing business alliance in North Brooklyn, and Uprose, an environmental organization based in Sunset Park who warned that the plan’s failure to recommend protections for industrial areas in Williamsburg and Greenpoint would soon bring real estate speculation and could displace some of North Brooklyn’s last remaining manufacturing hubs. 

“It’s sending a message to the market that it’s open season,” said Leah Archibald, Evergreen’s executive director. “They’re signalling to the market that they’re open to rezoning. And that alone imperils our business.”  

In a written statement to the Star, Department of City Planning (DCP) Deputy Press Secretary Joe Marvilli urged that public feedback from the town halls would inform the final report and that nothing is set in stone yet:

“As the first comprehensive look at our industrial sector in decades, the NYC Industrial Plan is a great opportunity to ensure that these businesses, workers, and surrounding communities all continue to thrive,“ he wrote. “These recommendations can guide policies to create enough space for everyone and secure the city’s economic success for years to come.” 

A feedback form about the plan can be found at www.nyc.gov/content/planning/pages/our-work/plans/citywide/nyc-industrial-plan. 

City planners highlighted the ways in which New York City’s industrial economy has changed at a Brooklyn town hall on October 16. Photo by Cole Sinanian.

The Industrial Plan

The draft plan is set to be updated every eight years, and was mandated by 2023’s Local Law 172, a bill sponsored by the Bronx city councilmember Amanda Farias. 

City planners researched the evolution of New York City’s industrial economy and surveyed the current distribution of industrial jobs across the five boroughs. The city’s industrial economy peaked in the mid-1950s, when industrial jobs accounted for nearly half of total employment. The industrial sector has shrunk since then but has also diversified, the draft report states. Newer kinds of industrial activity the report names include high-tech, prototyping, film, and green energy. More traditional industrial uses include construction, transportation, manufacturing, energy, utilities and waste management. 

The report found that less than half of the identified industrial jobs in the city are headquartered in areas zoned for manufacturing, or M zones, while only 25% are located in “Industrial Business Zones,” or IBZs. These zones, created in 2006, provide tax credits to industrial and manufacturing firms that relocate to one the of 21 currently designated IBZs in New York City. IBZs also carry a stated commitment by the City to not allow rezoning that would permit housing, all in an effort to preserve their manufacturing and industrial uses. 

Critics fear the plan’s failure to protect industrial zones in North Brooklyn’s IBZs — which, according to Evergreen, generate $15 billion in industrial economic activity — could invite real estate speculation and lead to future neighborhood displacement. 

“An immigrant industry”

Visitors to the 5th floor event space at St. Francis College where the town hall was held were promptly handed a flyer by an Uprose activist titled “The New Draft Plan is a Death Sentence for Manufacturing.” The flyer highlighted key points of the plan that activists saw as threatening to local manufacturing companies, like the proposed allowance of non-industrial development — namely office buildings, creative studios and housing — in what are currently IBZs.

Meanwhile, Archibald walked around the room arguing with DCP staffers and handing out copies of Evergreen’s condemnation of the plan. Evergreen’s statement argues that the plan would “create a blueprint for gentrification” and “drive out industrial employers,” thereby erasing “accessible, family-sustaining jobs.”

The custom tailor Martin Greenfield Clothiers is one of Evergreen’s North Brooklyn manufacturing companies. Founded by Martin Greenfield, a Holocaust survivor who immigrated to Brooklyn in the 1940s after escaping Auschwitz, the company has dressed the likes of Bill Clinton, Lebron James, Leonardo DiCaprio and Barack Obama. Martin Greenfield passed away in 2024 and his sons Tod and Jay have since taken over. Tod, who attended the town hall, said his company has provided a gateway to the American dream for countless immigrants. According to statistics provided by Evergreen, industrial jobs in North Brooklyn, like those at Martin Greenfield Clothiers, pay significantly higher wages than the Brooklyn average for workers with only a high school diploma. 

“These people can’t get a high tech job,” Greenfield said. “These jobs are the jobs they need. They live in the neighborhood, they walk to work, and this plan is going to gentrify the neighborhood. It’s going to push out their jobs, and it’s going to push them out.” 

“We have 70 employees and they’ve all put their kids through college,” he continued. “And they’re all immigrants. It’s an immigrant industry. It’s a place where someone without a college degree, and even without any language skills, can get a steady job. All they have to do is show up to work and be diligent. They have health care, they have a pension, they have a good wage, and they have an opportunity to establish their family and become citizens.” 

Greenfield compared his father’s experience in America with those of the immigrants who currently work for his company. When Martin Greenfield arrived in America, he was an orphan who didn’t speak English. It was a well-paying job in the manufacturing industry that allowed him to raise a family of first-generation Americans, his son said. The office jobs and tech jobs that the City’s plan suggests should come to North Brooklyn’s manufacturing corridor are generally not accessible to immigrants without English skills or a college degree. A major rezoning, Greenfield worries, could push many immigrants out of the area. 

“Those jobs are critical to that community,” Greenfield says. “And that community is important. Where am I going to get people to run our sewing machines once the neighborhood gentrifies?”

 

The Graves of Calvary Cemetery

BQE Admin on November 7, 2025

By JACOB BARNES

In the shadow of the Kosciuszko Bridge, you’ll find more than greenspace and fun times—just across Newtown Creek, in Queens County, is the largest cemetery in New York City: Old Calvary Cemetery. More dead people than living people can be found in the city’s most populous borough; Calvary alone has nearly three million burials. 

Calvary Cemetery has its own rich and fascinating backstory, tied firmly to the history of New York City’s impoverished Italian, Irish and German immigrants. Its age makes it a glorious showcase of some of the most beautifully carved tombstones and mausolea to be found in the state, alongside its large number of celebrities and notables interred there.

In the words of local Newtown Creek historian Mitch Waxman, the tale of Old Calvary is one of perpetual change. When it opened, most of the city skyline consisted of tenements, church steeples, and the occasional courthouse dome. By the time it was filled, the Empire State Building was being built. The practice in the early 19th century was to bury the dead of Manhattan in local church graveyards, or even in the dirt floor of the basement of the deceased’s house. After a series of cholera outbreaks, the city began doubting the wisdom of this practice and mandated the creation of a series of rural cemeteries, “out in the country,” in Mr. Waxman’s words, which at the time meant Queens County. 

Tombstones and office buildings. Photo by J. Barnes.

Under the leadership of Archbishop John “Dagger John” Hughes, an old and venerable Dutch homestead called the Alsop farm in Queens was bought for the construction of Calvary Cemetery. An army of Irish laborers descended on site in 1845 and proceeded to level the ground, landscape the terrain, and install a vast sewer system draining into Newtown Creek. By July 1848 the cemetery was ready to receive its first burial, a washerwoman named Esther Ennis, who died, Mr. Waxman says, “of a broken heart.” The following month, the site was officially consecrated by His Excellency. The graveyard takes its name from Mount Calvary, also known as Golgotha, the place of the skull, where Christ was crucified and where legend says Adam’s skull is buried. Millions of Catholic Italians, Germans, Irish and other ethnicities would be buried there in the coming years. 

Numerous Catholic Civil War dead were interred in Calvary. In 1863, the city bought part of Calvary from the Archdiocese of New York for the construction of a monument honoring Civil War soldiers, later finished in 1866. Only a year later, the cemetery was filled. The archdiocese bought more land and expanded, forming Second, Third and Fourth Calvary Cemetery several blocks east of Calvary Cemetery, now called Old or First Calvary.

Over the years, many of the stones appear to have melted, and numerous statues of the Virgin, angels, and the Christ Child appear to have been warped. A copper refining plant once sat across Newtown Creek in Greenpoint, spewing fumes across the water that induced decay in the statues. The archdiocese ultimately sued the refining plant and won a case against them in the early 20th century. Today, Calvary is one of the most prestigious cemeteries in the city, with burials continuing in the other three sections.

Calvary contains the costliest real estate in Queens; one plot in Calvary can reportedly cost as much as $600,000. Some of the city’s most notable citizens rest in Old Calvary, among them Patrick Jerome “Battle-Axe” Gleason, the last mayor of Long Island City; three Robert F. Wagners of political fame; Steve Brodie, who supposedly jumped from the Brooklyn Bridge and survived; and many now-forgotten Tammany Hall bosses. Numerous other gangsters are buried in Calvary as well, such as the Artichoke King, Lupo the Wolf, Sonny Black, the Clutch Hand, and Joe Diamond. 

Joe Masseria, the former head of the Genovese crime family whose death led to the formation of the Five Families, is also buried in Calvary. Fresh flowers are always placed on his grave; the identity of his mysterious mourner is unknown. Anthony Arillotta, former Genovese family capo, asked around but was unable to find any information right away. “The only thing I can offer is that it would be Joe’s family putting the flowers there,” Mr. Arillotta said. “No Mafia family would participate in that.”

The Calvary Monument honors Catholic civil war veterans. Photo by J. Barnes.

Aside from the stones and mausolea, St. Calixtus’s Chapel sits on Old Calvary’s grounds. The chapel has a large mausoleum underneath for the interment of religious sisters and brothers, nuns, and priests, which was recently rediscovered through the efforts of Mr. Waxman. Mr. Waxman is the former Newtown Creek Alliance’s group historian (among his numerous other titles) and provided most of the historical background for this article.

St. Calixtus takes its name from Pope Saint Calixtus, patron saint of cemetery workers. Prior to becoming bishop of Rome, Calixtus founded and maintained a cemetery that later bore his name on Rome’s outskirts. He ultimately became pope around A.D. 218 and served for four years before he was lynched by a Roman mob around A.D. 222. 

Among the cemetery’s most notable living inhabitants are red-tailed hawks, as well as flocks of migrating birds, which take advantage of the greenspace several times a year. The Audubon Society makes occasional forays into the graveyard to quantify and observe said birds. Coneys, the type of rabbit Coney Island takes its name from, are also frequently seen. Even in this place of death, life finds a way to thrive.

If you’re trying to get to Old Calvary Cemetery, don’t use Google Maps. Searching “Calvary Cemetery” directs you to Second Calvary Cemetery, the more modern addition, bordered by Third and Fourth Calvary Cemeteries. Old Calvary Cemetery is on Greenpoint Avenue and can be reached by taking the B24 to the Greenpoint Ave/Gale Av stop, right by the main gates. Another entrance is located at Laurel Hill Boulevard and Review Avenue. Old Calvary is open every day from 9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Mass for the souls of the dead is celebrated every Saturday at 10:00 a.m. in the St. Calixtus Chapel. 

When you visit, remember to always follow all cemetery rules and regulations, cooperate with staff and other personnel, and remain respectful of the dead, mourners, and other visitors.

NYC First Responders Make Less Than Food Delivery Workers

BQE Admin on November 7, 2025

Courtesy FDNY EMS Local 2507 

NYC EMS Union Launches Campaign Highlighting Low Pay, High Risk

By MOHAMED FARGHALY

mfarghaly@queensledger.com

The union representing more than 4,000 emergency medical technicians, paramedics and fire inspectors in New York City has launched a public awareness campaign to highlight what it calls “neglect” from City Hall, low pay, and worsening emergency response times that threaten public safety.

FDNY EMS Local 2507 kicked off the #StandWithEMS campaign on October 6, urging New Yorkers to pressure city officials to address long-standing pay disparities and staffing shortages among the city’s medical first responders.

Despite handling 1,630,466 medical emergencies in 2024, a 15.4% increase since the start of the pandemic, EMTs in the city earn just $18.94 an hour — a rate that union leaders say leaves many unable to afford to live where they work.

“We are world-class emergency response medical professionals and the FDNY is the busiest emergency medical response agency in the world,” said Local 2507 Union President Oren Barzilay. “Yet our front-line medical first responders are paid less per hour than most New Yorkers pay to babysitters or dog walkers.”

Barzilay said the situation has pushed EMTs to the brink. “We are literally working for minimum wage,” he said. “They keep passing legislation to improve the minimum wage for the private sector, food service delivery drivers, people in the food industry — they’re all making above what my men and women are making, which is $18 an hour. And if you take away all the deductions after taxes, we’re left with $12 and change.”

Courtesy NYC.Gov

The result, he said, is an attrition rate of about 70% within the first five years on the job. Many EMTs leave for higher-paying work elsewhere — including within the FDNY itself. “Just last Friday, 175 of my men and women resigned in one day to become firefighters, because they will make the same amount of money starting off,” Barzilay said.

The union says the consequences are already visible. According to the Mayor’s Management Report, emergency medical response times are up 1 minute and 47 seconds over the last four years. “People are literally dying because we don’t get there in time,” Barzilay said. He recounted stories shared at City Council hearings of New Yorkers who died waiting for ambulances that took 30 minutes or more to arrive. “This happens every day,” he said.

Barzilay described the situation as both a humanitarian and public safety crisis. “Our EMTs go through four months of training at the EMS Academy. Our paramedics go through nine months of rigorous medical training,” he said. “The training that we receive is how to bring somebody who has passed away back to life. We deal with people who are severely sick or injured, and we sustain their life until we get to the operating room.”

He said many EMS workers now struggle to meet basic needs. “I got men and women who can’t afford to commute to work every day. So they sleep at their station. They sleep at the car. Some are even living in shelters,” he said. “They love the job, but they just can’t afford to live here anymore.”

Barzilay said the pay inequity has persisted across administrations. “The mayor made a promise that he will fix this pay issue. The mayor before that made the same promise. Any mayor makes us the same promise that they will fix the EMS pay gap issues. But once they’re in office, they forget about you,” he said.

He also noted that over 50% of the FDNY EMS workforce are people of color and about 30% are women, arguing that the pay gap has a discriminatory dimension. “It’s discriminatory pay practices,” Barzilay said. “We brought this issue to the federal EEOC, and they ruled in our favor that we have a case and a claim to make against the city of New York.” The union has since filed a class action lawsuit that is now in the discovery phase.

Barzilay warned that as private partners such as Northwell Health withdraw their ambulance units from the city’s 911 system, Queens could soon see longer response times. “Queens is about to lose two ambulances from the private sector that operate under the 911 system,” he said. “Queens will start seeing a rise in response times if this is not corrected either.”

Through #StandWithEMS, Local 2507 is calling on the public to act. “Every citizen who understands our struggles [should] call the mayor’s office and tell them to fix this injustice,” Barzilay said. “We’re not looking for more than anybody else. We’re just looking for equal pay that other first responders have.”

For Queens EMT Esho, the path to emergency medical work began almost by accident. “A close friend told me that if you really don’t know what you’re doing, it’s kind of a safe play — a good introduction,” he said. Unsure of his next step, he applied, took the entry test, and was soon accepted into the 18-week EMS academy. What followed was months of training in anatomy, patient care, and field protocols — combined with the physical demands of daily cardio and endurance tests. “We started off with close to 300 people,” he said. “We graduated with 167.”

When he first stepped into the field, nerves set in. “I didn’t think I was ready. I thought I was gonna mess something up.” But his station quickly made him feel welcome. The station, like most across the city, doubles as both a workplace and a second home — a mix of ambulance bays, small offices, kitchens, and bunk areas for exhausted EMTs trying to grab minutes of rest between long calls.

Each shift begins with a check of the ambulance — “the bus,” as they call it — making sure every piece of gear is ready for the next emergency. Then the calls come. “It’s everything you can think of — cardiac arrests, respiratory distress, even toothaches,” Esho said. “If somebody calls 911, we go.” Some days it’s minor. Other days, it’s life and death. He still remembers one of his first cardiac arrests — a 65-year-old woman who overdosed. “It’s nothing like what you see in training,” he said. “You can’t prepare for the smell, the sight, or the family right there watching.”

In the academy, recruits are exposed to the realities of death early. “They even brought in corpses,” he said, to help prepare students who had never seen a body before. “They said it’s better to see it there than for the first time in the street.”

Now working overnight shifts in Queens, Esho describes EMS as “the ones who come when something happens outside the hospital.” Their job, he said, is to stabilize and transport — to keep patients alive long enough to hand them off to doctors and nurses. Without EMS, he said, “you’d just have a lot more deaths. People panic, they don’t know what to do. We’re the ones that take the problem by the horns and figure it out.”

Like many of his colleagues, he’s aware of the frustration over pay and staffing. Starting EMTs in New York City earn less than $19 an hour. “I kind of still don’t understand why we’re underpaid,” he said. “I see the impact we have every day. We’re helping people who can’t help themselves. But if we can’t afford to live, what’s gonna happen then?”

Esho said the low pay forces many EMTs into difficult personal situations, even as they continue to serve the city. “If we can’t help people anymore, not because we don’t want to, but because we can’t afford to, what happens then? We still have to eat, we still have to live,” he said. He noted that while some employees live with family and avoid rent, many others have no choice but to keep working under physical strain, including mothers, pregnant workers, and people recovering from surgery or injuries. “They’re still going because this is all they have. They’ve been building toward this for so long that they can’t do anything else,” he said. Despite the challenges, Esho acknowledged the dedication of his coworkers: “Even though the pay is low, there are EMS employees who are very passionate about the job and what they do.”

FDNY EMT Sophia Riccio of Battalion 44 in Brooklyn said she joined EMS because “the city needs EMTs that really care about patients. There are not enough EMTs or first responders and there are so many emergency calls all over the city. I love patient care and I love the medical field.”

She described the demands of the job as relentless, explaining, “The daily work conditions are not easy. We are all bombarded with calls and extremely busy, so EMTs are all getting run down. Just to get by, I have had to work close to 60 hours a week and it’s incredibly physically demanding. Mentally, you see a lot of things no one should see on a daily basis and it takes a big toll on all of us. Many EMTs have long commutes to their stations and we are not getting enough sleep. Anyone I talk to that is not EMS finds it disgusting how we get treated and paid. More people are dropping out of the service and calls are getting delayed as a result because there are not enough ambulances anymore. People ask themselves, ‘Why would I want to be in this job seeing these things and do so much for the city just to be paid like this?’”

Barzilay said the union’s ultimate goal is simple: “To get a decent, livable wage so nobody would leave here and go look for other jobs,” he said. “This is not only hurting my men and women, but it’s hurting the public. This is a public crisis.”

Barzilay ended with a plea for solidarity: “We save lives. Somebody needs to save us.”

E-Scooters See Record Numbers of Rides in Eastern Queens and the Bronx, and a Mix of Support and Scorn from Residents and Officials

BQE Admin on November 7, 2025

Evening passersby in front of a fleet of Lime e-scooters parked on College Point Boulevard near Citi Field in Flushing, Queens.

Nicholas Gordon

Electronic scooters are having a moment in the Bronx and Queens. It is a moment both celebratory and fraught, with soaring ridership and sobering pushback.

The New York City Department of Transportation Shared E-Scooter Program has seen record ridership since its launch in the East Bronx in August of 2021. As the program expanded into Eastern Queens in 2024, the three companies in the pilot program—Lime, Bird, Veo—logged more than two million total rides for the year. Lime alone reported over 1.1 million trips through June 2025, double the number from the same period the previous year.

Yet even as ridership climbs, New Yorkers are divided on the idea of having e-scooters in their city. Those in favor of e-scooters say they provide accessibility to mass transit hubs, reduce congestion and pollution, and come in handy while running errands around the neighborhood. Skeptics and naysayers report safety concerns, parking problems, and congestion, too.

A Transportation Necessity for Some

For Lime rider Anthony Rodriguez, e-scooters fill a transportation gap in his Bronx neighborhood. “Growing up in Soundview, the public transportation was horrible,” Rodriguez said. “We needed more options.”

Rodriguez, who now lives in Jersey City and works in Soundview, uses Lime everyday for the last leg of his commute after hopping off the ferry. “The e-scooter changed my experience, and it actually helped me determine if I’d take my job,” said Rodriquez, director of performing arts at Kips Bay Boys and Girls club in Soundview.

After raising concerns about haphazard parking, Rodriguez said Lime set up a designated parking area in the neighborhood. He has plans to collaborate on a community art project to paint the parking area “with some Bronx style.”

Anthony Rodriguez rides a Lime e-scooter for his daily commute to work in the Soundview neighborhood of the Bronx. Photo: Anthony Rodriguez

Lime Aims for Sustainability and Accessibility

Lime’s mission to provide transportation that is “shared, affordable, and carbon-free,” gels with DOT’s goals of encouraging micromobility and reduced car dependency.

Nicole Yearwood, Lime’s Senior Manager of Government Relations, noted that Lime is seeing some of its highest numbers of rides during commuting hours. “We’re connecting people to their local bus routes and train stations, in the first and last mile of their commute,” Yearwood said. “We also help connect New Yorkers in those hours when transit slows down, after late-night work shifts.”

The company estimates that the 2 million e-scooter trips by New York riders have saved over 500 thousand vehicle trips and over 24,000 gallons of gasoline. Lime aims for sustainability through using renewable energy for its facilities and fleets, and reducing emissions through durability and recycling.

City Officials Push Back in Queens

Several city officials in Queens remain vocal in their opposition to e-scooters. They complain that DOT lacks transparency in dealing with complaints about e-scooters, and has been a no-show for Town Halls to discuss concerns with community members.

“This program has been a total disaster,” said Councilmember James Gennaro in a statement. “The community does not want these scooters here. We call on this Administration and DOT to terminate this program in Northeast Queens immediately.”

Assemblymember David Weprin echoed those concerns, stating, “This e-scooter program is not the right fit for our neighborhoods. As elected officials and local community leaders, we were not consulted for input on the program and our residents’ voices are not being taken into account. There must be more stringent rules on who can operate these scooters and better education about where they can be used and stored.”

Assemblymember Sam Berger of Queens has urged DOT to terminate the e-scooter program in District 27, arguing, “This program has a need and a place but it is not here.”

Councilmember Sandra Ung introduced a bill last fall to ban e-scooters from areas in Eastern Queens, including Flushing, citing safety concerns, existing traffic and pedestrian congestion, and “chaotic deployment.”

The DOT did not respond to multiple requests for comments.

An e-scooter parking corral in the Flushing neighborhood of Queens. The corrals have pleased some locals by curtailing wayward parking, while others find the corrals an inconvenient restriction. Photo: Nicholas Gordon

Addressing the Concerns

Lime, for its part, has addressed these concerns with additional community outreach. Over the summer, the company piloted a “Parking Wardens” program, rewarding riders with free rides and prizes for proper parking.

Lime also continues to partner with community members for new events and initiatives. The company renewed its program connecting baseball fans to Citi Field on game days for the “subway series” between the Mets and Yankees, and sponsored Prime Month festivals in the Bronx and Queens. For New York Fashion Week, Lime collaborated with a Bronx-based jewelry label on a collection including a choker, bracelet, ring, and earrings made from retired scooter parts.

“We want to participate in any community event where we have the opportunity to demonstrate the vehicle to people and show the safety measures and answer questions,” Yearwood said, welcoming invitations to join new community events.

“I’m a lifelong New Yorker but every community is different, so it’s really important for us to create these kinds of local partnerships and get feedback from residents,” she said. “No one knows their community better than the people who are living there day to day.”

Mixed Feelings Persist

On a recent Friday night, Bryan Glenn and Mike Quinteros ventured from New Jersey to Queens for a Mets game. They picked up Lime e-scooters on College Point Boulevard to ride to Citi Field. Upon arriving, they discovered they weren’t allowed to park the e-scooters near the stadium, and had to backtrack. On their return, the e-scooters’ batteries died, forcing the two men to walk their machines through the crowded sidewalks to get to the parking corral.

“For me this is a deal-breaker,” said Glenn, a first-time Lime rider who was overheated from the ordeal on the warm night. “I thought we’d save time getting to the stadium with the scooter but the parking restrictions made us late.”

Quinteros, who has used e-scooters while visiting other cities, said he wasn’t going to give up on them. “Sometimes the no-go zones are massive with these things,” Quinteros said. “It’s just part of the program. We didn’t know the zones around here, but we do now.”

Cheryl Taylor, a passerby on College Point Boulevard observing the scene, said she’s not a fan of e-scooters. “I have small people I take care of and I don’t want them getting hurt,” Taylor said, with her two young sons by her side. “I’m a driver too and it feels dangerous with the scooters on the roads.” Taylor works on College Point Boulevard and lives in the Bronx, where she sees the scooters everyday, she said.

“Some people might like the scooters, they might be fun to ride on a nice day,” Taylor said. “But in my view, some neighborhoods are just too crowded already.”

New York City Marathon Becomes World’s Largest Marathon Ever with 59,000+ Finishers

BQE Admin on November 7, 2025

For the second year in a row, the 2025 New York City Marathon broke the global record for the largest marathon ever, with 59,226 finishers on Sunday, November 2. The TCS New York City Marathon, held on the first Sunday of November, attracts over 50,000 runners, including the world’s greatest professional athletes as well as runners of all experience levels, ages, genders, talents, and backgrounds. It seemed all of NYC took to the streets early Sunday afternoon to cheer on, offer fist bumps and hug the thousands of marathoners as they sweated their way through the different legs of the race.

The runners were sturdy and cheerful, spanning all ages and speeds. But it was the spectators who stole the show, waving signs that spanned the political to the risqué, sipping pumpkin IPAs and generally taking advantage of the unseasonably warm November Sunday as an excuse to day drink while showing up for their more athletic friends and family members.

Near Lafayette Street and St. James Place, a woman carrying a sign that read “Run like you’re escaping the Louvre Heist” dangled a pretzel in front of runners in what appeared to be a taunt. Across the street, a sign with a different kind of taunt: “Did you turn your stove off?”

Whether the taunts effectively boosted the runners’ speed is hard to say, though the sign carriers were a spectacle in their own right. Anyone wondering what’s generally on the minds of city residents in late 2025 need look no further than the marathon route. References to the Paris Louvre Heist of last month were abundant. As was AI— running is a sport not easily infiltrated by machines, as New Yorkers were eager to point out. “Keep Running. AI Ain’t Taking This Job,” read one sign. “AI could NEVER!!” read another. Election day is Tuesday and by the looks of it voter turnout will be high. Mamdani canvassers seized the moment’s  good vibes to ensure their candidate’s win, handing out voting info and carrying near-life-size cutouts of the assemblyman. Cuomo could be found elsewhere: “Run like Cuomo is behind you,” one sign read. Another, inexplicably, displayed the word “Poop!”

The cheering was not limited to friends and family members. Near Lafayette and St. James Place, Clinton Hill’s beanie-clad millennials rang cowbells and doled out high-fives and “Let’s go ya’ll”s to each and every passing marathoner. One group looked at each passing runner’s name tag to give personalized pep talks.

The only one not enjoying herself was Sunny, a small terrier cowering from the noise in a young woman’s arms. “She hates it here,” the owner said.

A Coming Fight for the Soul of the Democratic Party

BQE Admin on November 7, 2025

Robert Hornak

Robert Hornak is a veteran political consultant who has previously served as the Deputy Director of the Republican Assembly Leader’s NYC office and as Executive Director of the Queens Republican Party. He can be reached at rahornak@gmail. com and @roberthornak on X.

Tuesday was election day, but when you read this we should al- ready know who the next mayor will be. According to all the polls, that will be Zohran Mamdani.

Mamdani’s win will be due to his running the best campaign in this contest, with energy and a positive message. And while you can argue with his message on many levels, and I surely have, he had the only positive message in the race and that appeals more to people than just attacking the other candidates.

But win or lose, Mamdani’s unarguable success this year in coming from nowhere to become the Democrats primary winner over a former governor with a famous last name, poses many challenges for the Democratic Party.

Yes, it signals a changing of the guard for the party, but it also signals a potentially new direction for them, and that direction may not be one that many traditional democrats can accept. While generation- al shifts are inevitable, directional ones don’t happen without a big fight.

Mamdani is highly controversial, like AOC before him but much more so. As mayor of the biggest and most dynamic city in the country, he will be able to wield power like no other in his party. And he strongly represents the direction the Democratic Party has been slowly moving in, an anti-American and western values, and strongly pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel direction that makes many in his own party uncomfortable.

So much so that many major figures in the Democratic Party refused to endorse him, including most of NYC’s congressional delegation, the Queens Democratic Party, and major figures in the par- ty including Chuck Schumer and Barack Obama.

However, Mamdani’s success goes well beyond just his campaign, he has built a machine that the far left in the party tried to create through the Working Families Party but have not seen anywhere near the success that that the Socialist movement has had. Where the WFP was able to influence the Democratic Party to a small degree, the DSA has infiltrated and is taking over the Party in NY.

And there lies the problem, many Democrats do not hold the sentiments that Mamdani and his movement strongly believe in. And the movement they are building is not looking to peacefully coexist with the old guard.

They are already promising to primary a number of local elected Democrats next year and there are likely many more to come. And many moderate elected Democrats are in fear of the power of this radi- cal movement and their ability to mobilize younger voters and focus them on the races they can win.

As the Democratic Party is pushed to be more anti-Israel, many Jews and those who support Israel and our shared western values will be pushed out of power in the Party and possibly out of the Party altogether. Will this lead to most joining the Republican Party, becoming Independents and a swing voting bloc, or possibly starting a new par- ty remains to be seen.

Yes, the Republicans have had their internal conflicts as well, and are dealing with another one now with the likes of Tucker Carlson and a few influencers who harbor their own antisemitic views. But they are being quickly marginalized by republicans who are over- whelmingly pro-Israel and are not willing to accept people like Nick Fuentes into the party just like they pushed out David Duke, the former KKK Grand Wizard who switched from Democrat to Republican a few years earlier, in his 1981 run for governor of Louisiana.

This appears to be an existential crisis for the Democrats and will determine not only what direction the party will go in, but what it’s most basic and core values will be and what kind of country they will work toward. This goes way beyond the typical conflicts over spending priorities, fights over the debt, or any specific policy. This appears to be heading toward a divide between those who love America and what it currently stands for and those who don’t and want to radically change it into something very, very different.

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